When Will Google Calendar Be Back?

There are a few things that make the internet lose its collective, tech-obsessed brain (rescue puppies, new coffee house concoctions, and pretty highlighter kits, to name a few), but when some aspect of the internet fails? Well, that's one of the big ones. After Google Calendar began experiencing issues on Thursday, for example, all anyone could ask was, "When will Google Calendar be back?" Because unfortunately, it was down for what felt like a really long time all over the world, and apparently we're incapable of functioning without it. But there's good news: As of 11:33 a.m. ET, a fix has been put into place and Google Calendar service has been restored for many users, with a full resolution expected soon.

Mashable reported on Thursday morning that both Google Calendar and Google Hangouts appeared to be malfunctioning for many users. The fact that it happened at peak work time for a lot of people was particularly infuriating; those of us who practically live on the phone and desktop apps and use them to plan our entire day's worth of meetings, appointments, and work activities suddenly found ourselves unmoored. Users attempting to access Calendar were largely greeted by a service error preventing them from going any further. Meanwhile, there were also reports from users on Twitter from all corners of the globe that an issue with Hangouts prevented them from organizing conference calls and other meetings.

During the hours in which these two productivity tools were down, there were lots of panic-laden tweets being fired out; many of them are comedy gold, though, so at least we all got a laugh while we were waiting for a fix. And the good news is that at the time of this writing, the service indicator on the Google App Status Dashboard has moved from the category red "service outage" to the less worrying, amber-colored "service disruption" classification; furthermore, at 11:33 a.m. ET, an update informed us that "Google Calendar service has already been restored for some users, and we expect a resolution for all users in the near future." So the answer to the question of "when" is ultimately, "If not already, then very, very soon."

Phew.

Although unfortunately, that probably means that it's business as usual wherever you are, and yes, that appraisal with your boss is still going ahead.

If you want to keep an eye on further updates, head to the App Status Dashboard page for Google Calendar. Just bear in mind, though, that the service updates seen here can be a little delayed, according to Mashable.